1966 - Surfin' With A Tornado

1966 – Surfin’ With A Tornado

It had been a stormy week but this morning the air was calm and the weather was sunny so, although storm warnings continued it simply meant to us the lake had probably awakened to a beautiful controlled fury that meant – SURF’S UP!!

It was late in the summer and the air was still and humid. It was a perfect day to get into the water and catch some waves. I made a couple of calls to a Kerry who lived at the shore and could easily give a surf report – ‘twas small but possibilities, because of the weather we were lookin’ good! We threw the boards in the back of dad’s station wagon and headed out to our surf beach. The main area was near an informal parking area a little way down from Kerry’s house and the surf shack that we had erected from railroad ties and other debris that drifted in with the current. Next year we would find all of the houses in the area condemned in preparation for the new site of a nuclear power plant. At the end of that summer we would hold a party that would end with burning the surf shack to the ground when some of us realized the next year our beach would be covered by a heavy concrete pad in preparation for the installation of a nuclear containment chamber.

But this year all of that was in the unknown future and all we could think of was getting in some water time.

I was one of over a dozen members of DBSC – the Dunes Beach Surf Club – our local surfing organization. All together there were several hundred surfers on the Great Lakes and our president, Kerry, was one of the originals on our side of the lake. Kerry had moved to the shores of Lake Michigan from the west coast and awoke one story morning to the sound of surf. He had packed his board away assuming he would not have use for it in his new home but now figured there might still be a chance to ride again! The surf was small and choppy and faster than he was used to but it was possible to ride! Since then he and his buddies had been talking surf talk and wearing iron crosses, all the rage in 1965 in the surf world. It was this style of decoration to which I had taken exception. Being an avid reader of Surfer Magazine I had been following the controversy surrounding the wearing of what was, to many, a symbol of Nazi Germany and everything they represented. The local surfers, like most surfers nationwide, did not feel this way. As I was undergoing a political awakening that would eventually include the radical acts of protesting against Viet Nam and for equal rights for blacks and women but, just for this moment, I was rejecting radical symbols of Nazism. In my belief that I had to have my say I called Kerry one evening to protest the wearing of these offensive symbols. To me this was a very brave thing to do because Kerry was, to me, one of the coolest guys in class, after all he was: tall, blonde, from California and a surfer…how cool could you be?

Although Kerry staunchly defended the style he and his friends had chosen he was very nice about it and he was impressed that there was someone else passionate enough about surfing to have a definite opinion. He invited me to a club meeting and to accompany himself, Harold or Jim at the beach. Kerry and I would eventually become good friends and even joined the Navy together on the Buddy-System (we were separated after 2-days.) But, like many things, the Navy was still in our distant future.

We were disappointed when we arrived to low surf that wasn’t worth much but as the morning wore on the height of the surf built until it offered what Lake Michigan called a pretty good ride topping out around 4’. We frolicked and swam and surfed until we were worn out and left before noon to get some fast food at Zippy’s, a hamburger eatery owned by one of our club member’s family. By noon we had returned to find the surf more wild but the air even calmer. There was an ominous feeling to the air which we ignored as the surf was calling us loudly. We headed out and struggled through the break to sit “outside” where the waves are smoother before humping up on the series of sand bars that punched the waves up to their maximum available height. We were catching some driving fast sets when we noticed “The Duck” coming down the hill from town.

I should pause here to explain the general attitude regarding Lake Michigan among the residents of the communities that line the western side of the lake. From Chicago to Green Bay the attitude was generally the same: the lake meant danger and often death. As we were told: there have been more ships sunk on the Great lakes then in all of the oceans of the world. I always had trouble believing this “fact” but this is what I was told and reflected the general attitude of the adult population in the area regarding the lake. Obviously that was not how we felt but many of our parents, relatives, bystanders and city officials did, so it was understandable that someone had panicked and decided it was time to get the “kids” out of the water. Of course, this day, worry was reinforced by some remote thunderstorms and, for everyone else, tornado warnings of which we were blithely unaware. Hence: The Duck.

The Duck was a used military landing-craft that the city had purchased for emergencies just like the one they were faced with: crazy kids on the lake in great danger!! It was still an Army green color with big bald tires and a loud, smoky diesel engine with ineffective mufflers and a top speed of just a few miles an-hour.

We could see the Duck coming a mile away since the lake is surrounded by a low moraine plateau about a half-mile back from the shoreline. The roads that lead down to the shoreline are few and clearly seen so traffic is quite apparent particularly from off-shore where our view was not interrupted by trees or structures. We sat laughing and joking that the craft actually coming for us as this had been threatened in the past but, as we found this idea to be completely laughable we didn’t take this suggestion seriously until they pulled out onto our beach. The inhabitants of the duck climbed out to high spots on the vehicle and waved at us shouting words that were quickly carried away by the wind. We laughed and waved back. After a good ten-minutes of waving, with the waving growing increasingly frantic, the inhabitants of the duck gave up their waving and disappeared inside the vehicle which started with a puff of black smoke and, from our vantage point, a low-pitched growl that represented engine noise. The gears were engaged and the Duck moved slowly toward the water.

They were about 10 feet into the water when we noticed the vehicle first react to the surf with a short bob of its nose toward the oncoming rollers. It paused, engine racing high enough for us to now clearly hear the noise until it was dropped back into gear and, with a little jump, continued its creep forward. As it got further from the shore the waves caused the craft to begin bouncing up and down in the shore-break. The craft crabbed sideways a little bit and the vehicle began rocking violently side-to-side until the driver regained control and the craft cautiously headed straight out into the surf. It moved forward at an agonizingly slow pace diving headlong into the waves. Each dive was followed by the nose starting an ascent toward the sky when it would fall heavily back with a big splash and a roar of the engine as the propeller spun loose coming clear of the water when the nose dipped back down after its look at the sky. Although pleas for our attention had continued when the vehicle had first started into the water the shouting for our safety stopped abruptly when the craft first dipped into the first wave. They had not been heard or seen since.

As the Duck came closer we all pushed off into a couple of fair-sized waves that took us on a path that slid right by the Duck as they floundered around in the surf. As I went by I noticed 3-people inside holding on to seats and any other item that was bolted securely to the deck. They looked as though they were more worried about the wisdom of the idea to use the Duck in the surf than our immediate welfare. The passenger closest to me was looking a little green around the gills and did not look like he was enjoying himself as our eyes met. His eyes appeared to defocus as he turned his face toward mine displaying a sick-looking grimace and a worried forehead.

Arriving ashore we threw the boards into our various vehicles, a few of us leaving for home. Most of us stood and watched the Duck try to turn around in the surf. Unfortunately after we passed them and headed ashore they had not proceeded outside where the waves were much calmer. Instead they began to immediately turn around catching themselves in the worst spot they could possibly be: right in the middle of the breaking surf. Although the waves were not enormous they still contained a lot of power which all of we surfers had experienced. Fresh water was substantially heaver than salt-water which meant the craft was less buoyant than its design had originally planned. They bobbed sluggishly in the surf threatening more than once to dip a rail underwater only to bob back up at the last second. As we were seriously worried about their welfare we held station near our cars in preparation of rescue operations. We watched for several minutes until the Duck was no longer in danger and was headed back towards shore when we jumped in our cars and headed to Kerry’s for Cokes. As it was still early in the afternoon we intended to get in a few more rides before we called it a day. After a half-hour or so we headed back to the beach confirming the Duck and its inhabitants were long gone.

I was sitting outside the break looking over my right shoulder when John shouted, “Look!!” I turned toward John to see him pointing south toward Zion where, about a mile away, we saw a tall tornado tearing through the ubiquitous swamps bordering the lake. It was dark and ominous but, to this point silent. As we watched the howling wind began to sound like a fast-moving freight-train that we heard clearly and which sent a shudder through each of us. The main funnel spun wildly around the base of the dark cloud from which it originated spinning clockwise toward the lake then cutting straight across the swamp to take an unexpected turn and rush in a new unexpected direction. We turned toward the shore as we were all now properly concerned now that the sound was so clear but before I could recline into a paddling position the Finger-Of-God, which is the part of the tornado that reaches down from the cloud, suddenly jumped off of the ground and thrust its mouth into the lake still well south of our location. The funnel immediately turned a muddy brown which, although still dark and ominous skipped lightly back over the swamp dipping toward the water again then backing off. Suddenly it twisted violently into the lake and a white foamy line shot halfway up the funnel. The foamy line of white dipped twice back down towards the ground before shooting the length of the funnel turning it snow white and changing the tone to a lower tone more reminiscent of a low growl than the on rushing freight-train it had been until now. Before we had a chance to react the funnel turned back towards the land and almost immediately turned the familiar muddy brown all-at-once without the transition we had seen when it turned a foamy white. It then turned a hellish black color as we noticed the light surrounding us was an unreal green. Any wind in the air was long gone and we turned towards each other all displaying wide eyes and open mouths. Even the waves had abruptly shrank in size. As a unit we turned simultaneously toward the beach and paddled towards the shore with all the strength in our young arms. We didn’t drop into a wave or enjoy the sensation of a fast ride. We paddled like our lives depended upon it and threw our surfboards into our cars. I headed home now concerned about the weather and the welfare of my family.

As I remember we were all out surfing the next day relating our experience and enjoying life. Although I remember getting together that’s about all I remember about the next day…it was clearly not nearly as memorable…thank goodness!